Nile Gardiner is a Washington-based foreign affairs analyst and political commentator. A former aide to Margaret Thatcher, Gardiner has served as a foreign policy adviser to two US presidential campaigns. He appears frequently on American and British television, including Fox News Channel, BBC, and Fox Business Network.

Kenny MacAskill must go: The Scottish Justice Secretary’s position is untenable following new Lockerbie revelations

Nearly one year on from the release of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, the Scottish cabinet minister who freed him remains in office. Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill continues to defend his decision to release a mass murdering terrorist as one taken “in good faith”. Just last week, in an interview with Scottish television, he remorselessly declared:

I authorised it. I did so in good faith and I believe everybody who's been involved in this has also acted in good faith. It was my responsibility and I stand by my actions.

Mr. MacAskill continues to sit with smug impunity in Edinburgh never once expressing regret for his actions. But his flimsy defence for Megrahi’s release is now collapsing all around him. The Scottish authorities have contended all along that the Lockerbie bomber was freed on" compassionate grounds" on the basis that he only had three months to live, on the recommendation of medical “specialists” who supposedly shared a “firm consensus”.

Al-Megrahi of course is far from dead, and is living in the lap of luxury in a villa in Tripoli under the protection of Libyan tyrant Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. He is reportedly being given a “medical cure” drug, which may extend his life for a further 18 months.

The Sunday Telegraph reveals today however that “the prison doctor who played a key role in the release of the Lockerbie bomber is a GP with no specialist cancer knowledge.”

As The Telegraph reports:

Dr. Peter Kay, who until now has only been identified by the Scottish government as an unnamed “primary care physician” of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi’s, provided a crucial medical report which led to the conclusion that the prisoner was likely to have three months, or less, to live… According to the General Medical Council, which contains information on all qualified doctors, he has been registered as a GP since 2006 and he is not on any specialist register.

Even more embarrassingly for the Scottish government, a Sunday Times investigation has just revealed that the key NHS medical specialists involved in Megrahi’s treatment while he was incarcerated in Scotland, including Dr. Zak Letif, Megrahi’s urologist, were never even consulted on his release. This report shatters the arguments of Scottish authorities on the Lockerbie matter, and its findings clearly suggest that the Scottish Government has not been honest with the general public and the world’s media.

The Sunday Times tracked down all four key experts involved in Megrahi’s care, and found that not one of them had been consulted on the release of the Lockerbie bomber, although a doctor paid for by the Libyan government had been asked for his opinion.

none of them signed off on the three-month prognosis — nor were they contacted before Megrahi’s triumphant return to Libya on August 20 last year. One of the doctors said last week that he had had nothing to do with the case since October 2008.

Scottish ministers last year published a report by Dr Andrew Fraser, director of health and care at the Scottish Prison Service, which highlighted the input of four specialists in the case — but their names were blacked out. Last week, the Scottish government reiterated that Fraser “drew on expert advice from a number of cancer specialists in coming to his clinical assessment that a three-month prognosis was a reasonable estimate for Megrahi”. However, Latif said he had never had any dealings with Fraser: “I’ve never met or spoken to him.”

It has also emerged that the Scottish government — contrary to its denials — considered the views of Ibrahim Sherif, a doctor paid by Libya to assess Megrahi. Sherif concluded that Megrahi had only three months to live.

It is hard to see how Kenny MacAskill can stay in office in the wake of these latest, highly damaging revelations, which destroy the myth that the Scottish Government acted upon expert medical advice. By all accounts, the release of the Lockerbie bomber was a farce, and the attempts by Scottish authorities to defend it look increasingly pathetic. As I wrote a year ago, the convicted murderer of 270 people in the bombing of PamAm Flight 103 over Lockerbie in December 1988 should never have been freed, and MacAskill should have faced the consequences for his actions much earlier.

Not only should the Justice Secretary have the decency to finally step down, but he also also owes a huge apology to the families of the victims of the Lockerbie bomber. While Megrahi is a free man and feted as a hero by the Libyan regime, the fathers, mothers, daughters, sons, brothers and sisters of those who died at his hands are still suffering. It is they who deserve compassion, and not the brutal killer who now enjoys his freedom. MacAskill’s appalling decision has shamed his nation, and he must take responsibility for it.

These latest developments should also increase the pressure for the full release by Scottish authorities of all medical evidence relating to al-Megrahi, as well as the launch of an independent inquiry by the Coalition government into the role of British officials in the bomber’s release.